Hulkenberg hopeful of continuing points run

21 June 2014 – Nico Hülkenberg says he is confident of continuing his points run at the Austrian Grand Prix despite having his best lap time deleted during the final moments of qualifying.

Hülkenberg was one of several drivers to exceed track limits on the exit of turn eight and have his lap time disallowed by the stewards.

As a result, the Force India driver will start the race from 10th on the grid.

"I felt pretty good through all of qualifying and was building up my speed nicely for Q3," he said. "It's a shame my lap in Q3 was disallowed, but it's difficult when you're pushing so hard and I obviously ran a little bit wide.

"At the end of the day losing the lap only changed the result by a few positions so I'm still in good shape for the race. It's been a long time since Formula One was last here so there are a lot of unanswered questions going into the race.

"We don't know how the different strategies will unfold, or how the tyres will behave, but I think we've shown recently that we have a very strong race car. Points will be the goal tomorrow."

Sergio Pérez, who admitted that he was unable to get the tyres working at their optimum performance, will start from 16th on the grid following his five place grid penalty.

"The first lap will be important and strategy will be crucial to get a good result because overtaking looks to be difficult around here," he said. "We have a lot of tyres available for the race so we should try and use this to our advantage to move up into the points."

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